


Pale as Cerulean

by thundercracker



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Dysfunctional Relationships, F/M, Meteor fic, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-03
Updated: 2016-05-03
Packaged: 2018-06-06 03:22:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6736036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thundercracker/pseuds/thundercracker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Karkat didn't know what the hell they were trying to play at with this moirallegiance thing. <br/>That makes two of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pale as Cerulean

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rhonda](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rhonda/gifts).



“You know what your problem is?”

“Which one?” Karkat said flatly, lip quirked in what could be the beginning of either a grin or a grimace. Vriska laughed into his ear and _G-d_ , was it strange to hear her laugh without malice or mockery; hers was a biting, jolting laugh that stung his insides with nostalgia. 

She gathered herself from her seat and scooted herself up the horn pile behind Karkat, wrapping her legs around him, shoved fingers under his hair in a way that could be called gingerly only for her. (Both of them hated that shitty pile. Everyone did. But Vriska no longer had her piles of boonbonds, and the only other thing there was enough of for decent pile-building was those g-ddamn horns. Horns and scalemates, and no way were either of them messing with those.)

“That’s exactly it,” she replied at last. The other could hear the grin in her voice. “Always being so hard on yourself! Just relax and admit it’s not allllllllways about you.”

“Wow,” Karkat half-scoffed, “thanks for the absolute most pointless advice ever. Maybe you should listen to yourself some time.”

“ _You_ blame yourself for everything wrong with your life.  _I_ do what’s best for us as a whole,” corrected Vriska; her superior tone was seeping through her self-justifying horseshit again. A finger wrapped an unkempt black wisp of hair around itself and fiddled. “I do what I can! That just means that some people have to give a little more!”

“Like their fucking lives?” the smaller grumbled. Both knew there was no venom in the words, not anymore.

“Yeah, sometimes!” she laughed, and it was so truly trollish, unabashedly unconcerned with her friends’ deaths (not like most of them would be, like Nepeta and Tavros and hell, even Terezi) that he didn’t retort. 

Karkat sighed and drooped his head forwards, his moirail’s fingers keeping pace and continuing their strangely gentle-but-not-really exploration of his scalp.

It felt… sort of nice.

It mostly felt wrong.

He knew he’d have to say something—today, hopefully, unless he (as his past self always did) started acting with the dignity of some squirming wriggler losing his vestigial legs and pissing itself in a self-propagating shame parade as soon as the topic of pity was broached. Shit, alright, he could handle this today.

His moirail for the time being, unaware of him feeling about as guilty as Tavros ( _rest in pieces_ ) after doing literally anything, continued on.

“My point is, you think you messed everything up? If you did, too bad! The rest of us have to deal with the bullshit you caused, so get over yourself and help everyone else pick up the pieces instead of thinking about how it’s your fault!”

Karkat drew his legs up.

“Plus, like, everyone messed up just as bad as you, you loser.”

“That’s real reassuring,” he mumbles.

“It's supposed to be.”

They sat in silence a while. Karkat could hear the sound of spindly fingers against his hair.

“You’re fucking hard to pity,” he said finally, and suddenly it was too late to back out of the dreaded conversation.

“What?”

“What the fuck am I supposed to pity you for?” the troll boy began, and suddenly the words were gleaming in his mind, spilling from him, and _oh G-d oh G-d_ there’s no going back now, what the hell was he thinking? (He was thinking he needed to end this charade, needed to give this douchebag a piece of his mind, needed to say the words so he would finally have to acknowledge how fucked up this all had become, but now he wasn't sure.) 

“How is anyone supposed to pity _Vriska_ fucking _Serket_ , most terrifying and brutal asshole in paradox space not actively trying to kill us all at the moment? What am I supposed to be feeling here, because I sure as hell don’t feel anything except utter bafflement about why we ever started this bullshit palemance masquerade!”  

(His arms were flailing now, not sure what to do; one hand clawed through his hair, touched Vriska's own, and jerked back into gesticulations as if fanning a burned finger.) 

“And even _if_ you had a single pitiable trait other than being universally hated—due to your own backstabbing fuckups, might I fucking add? You say shit like this and, alright, maybe you can feel pity, platonic pity, but it has become glaringly fucking obvious that you just look down on everyone, you don’t care about anyone but yourself and—occasionally, if you’re feeling extra g-ddamn generous, Terezi or John—and you’re sure as hell not pale for them. You don't even strictly fucking _need_ a moirail, you at least have the sense to know that the killing-the-last-of-our-species option is off the table!” 

“You don’t know how to take care of anyone, and even when you try–” here he brushed her hand from his head– “it’s not romantic, this is just what normal fucking friends would do if you didn’t chase off everyone by being a fucking antagonistic asshole all the time, except everyone's sitting in piles like freshly-pupated wrigglers who just found out about the magical world of quadrants!”

A bit weakly, he concluded, "So basically, what the absolute fuck are we doing?"

Hahahahaha ohhh shit.

Oh shit.

She was probably pissed.

She was angry and Karkat leaned back into her and took her hand and why the hell was he still doing this. He felt like his own damn auspistice. 

But Vriska’s body—he had felt it tense and stiffen as he spoke, felt it pull itself upright—began to loosen. He shouldn’t be doing this. He was leading her on. He had spoken his mind, though, and she must have known that this was only a platonic comfort. An obligatory response to her anger.

“You,” she said, her voice not quite hiding a hiss, “are a piss-poor excuse for a moirail.”

“Yeah, well,” Karkat replied, and pressed his head back into the bone of her shoulder. “So are you, asshole.”

“You’re half-pale for the world, Vantas, but never the right way.”

“And you couldn’t be pale for a soul if another fucked up spider-girl like you crawled out of the Veil and told you she had to mercy-kill her lusus.”

“Well,” she laughed, and it was bitter and biting and felt like a needle in his neck, and her clavicle felt like it might cut into his ear with the force of her movement,  “between the two of us we’re almost a decent troll.”


End file.
